FIH chief may help end Indian hockey impasse

16 Jun 2009: Pradeep Vijayakar / V Narayan Swamy,TNN

MUMBAI/BANGALORE: International Hockey Federation (FIH) president Leandro Negre may well play the role of a mediator when he visits India next week.
At least, that’s what JB Roy wants him to do as the two grapple with a flawed unified body called Hockey India.

In what will be a sharp two-point agenda aimed at both Indian Olympic Association president Suresh Kalmadi and Negre, the Bengal Hockey Association supremo will put forward two questions during his meeting with them in the coming days.

“I will ask Kalmadi how the same IOA which disaffiliated the Indian Hockey Federation headed by KPS Gill for various reasons last year can join hands with him now in the name of Hockey India. What sort of unholy nexus is this? I will repeat this point to Negre when he is in India on June 25,” Roy told TOI, referring to the alliance that was formally announced in New Delhi on Sunday.

“Whether we will be part of Hockey India or not is not the question now. I will also tell Kalmadi categorically that free and fair elections are the only way forward for hockey in this country. This is the demand of all the state associations, both men and women, which assembled at Aamby Valley.

If he agrees with our line of thinking, we can take the issue forward,” said Roy, who has been invited by Kalmadi for talks at the behest of Negre.

However, Roy sees a more significant role for Negre. “I will impress upon Mr Negre that we need elections as quickly as possible. We are ready to accept whoever becomes the president. I would sincerely request him to prevail upon Kalmadi that only if elections are announced can we come together.”

But will the Spaniard bite the bullet? Apparently, Negre knows his role is limited but Roy believes the FIH president can use his position to change the situation for the better in the country.

This was also pretty much the abiding thought among the 22 men and 20 women’s hockey associations which met at Aamby Valley last weekend to study the hasty formation of Hockey India and suggest ways to counter the ‘autocratic ways of the IOA’.

At the end of it all, the units authorised Roy and former Indian Women’s Hockey Federation secretary Amrit Bose to head the negotiations on their behalf with the FIH, the Asian Hockey Federation and the IOA.

Among those who attended were Olympians Gurbux Singh from Bengal and V Baskaran from Tamil Nadu as well as Karnataka State Hockey Association secretary K Krishnamurthy.

Bengal association secretary Gurbux regretted that the seven-member committee of Hockey India did not have any persons with hockey background as part of it. “Hockey India president AK Mattoo has a record of being expelled from a boxing association, while its secretary Mohammad Aslam Khan does not represent any state body. Why should we accept such a federation then?” he asked.